The XO Tour Lif3
Now I’m sure most of you who have read my stuff before are probably thinking, Oh. My. God. Shut the fuck about the Red Light District, we already get that being a tour guide can be crazy etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. But this is different, I’m referring to sitting in a jam packed car for hours, with instruments and music gear filling the back so much that the driver can’t even use the rear view mirror. I’m talking about dealing with promiscuous venue hosts that are drugged and/or/also drunk. I’m telling you about the life of a young music tour manager.
Now I can tell you the entire story of how I got this job. I can give you countless stories about sights I have seen from backstage, but instead I am just going to tell the story of one particular gig.
I received the email that had the schedule from the venue host a week before we were set to perform. I was happy to find out that the venue is only a 30 minute ride away from Amsterdam - we were used to 4 hour car rides into Belgium at this point. So the logistics planning started to begin, the first issue we came across was the mode of transport. We had to bring all of our backline (for you non-musicians that’s the music gear you need to do a show) into a small early 2000’s Ford. Think clowns in a tiny car, but replace clowns with amplifiers, synths, guitars, bass guitars, drumset, effect pedals, audio interfaces, and lots and lots of cables. After a few days of brainstorming, we agreed the best way to do it is by taking two trips. So when the day came, we loaded the car up, started the speed down the highway to the countryside of Amsterdam.
At first, it was only the band leader Ruben and I - we couldn't fit the rest of the boys yet. While on our drive to the venue, we were discussing how it was pretty uncommon for us to be booked for a wedding and how it was the first time for the band to be performing in a farmhouse. When I read farmhouse in the email I thought, what the fuck. But when we got there… It. Was. Boujee. I mean beautiful green flat lands surrounding this century old cow stable that has been impeccably taken care of, and the typical white tables and chairs laid out in the front for the party participants. I remember looking at the venue and telling Ruben that these people had serious money. Ruben nodded in agreement, whilst still looking at the venue, he then jokingly said that it felt like a Hollywood party. As we were appreciating the venue, we saw a lady wearing a sparkly silver dress appear from the farmhouse, she started to wave at us.
We walked towards her and it was the hostess, formalities were in order, so we shook hands and said our names out loud in normal human fashion. The hostess gave us a little tour of the venue while holding a full glass of champagne. I could tell it wasn’t her first nor was it her last. She brought us the artist lounge, it felt like I was sent back to 1946 but it was nevertheless comfortable. So Ruben and I started to unpack, we then drove back to Amsterdam, picked up the boys and the rest of the equipment and came back.
When we got to the venue, we unpacked the equipment, then built it on the stage, and went through an hour or two of soundcheck. Ruben's quite the perfectionist. But this is where it gets interesting, after soundcheck we were invited to eat with the guests, it was a buffet set up. When we were lining up to get food onto our plates, the band members started to whisper amongst each other. I quickly asked what was going on, and then it suddenly struck me. Everyone in the wedding was in either an A-list or B-list celebrity. Now the pressure was on, so the band ate quickly and started to warm up. While sitting in the artist lounge, we drank our beers, searched up all the celebrities that we saw on google to make sure that it was actually them and threw some jokes around. Then it was showtime.
Right before the boys had to go on stage, the hostess came to us to tell us that there was going to be an afterparty and we were welcome to join. She then told us to break our legs and the show started. I tell you what, it was a hell of a show, at this point everyone was probably down two bottles of bubbles. It was a good crowd.
When the band finished up, we went backstage and had a couple of beers. After downing a couple we decided to join the party. This is where it gets weird. The drunk hostess came up to us with more drinks and we started to have a chat. She started making all these racist jokes towards me and giving me a hard time, luckily the band could see I had fumes coming out of my ears so they stood up for me and told the hostess to stop. She was a bit shocked and walked away.
Quickly she came back, and I was thinking it was for an apology but instead she came with ice cream. As she licked two popsicles simultaneously, she gave one to each band member and myself. It was quite a hot day so I was excited to dig in, but as I was about to, Ruben took my ice cream and threw it far from me. I looked at him a bit surprised, he then whispered in my ear that the hostess had put a good amount of MDMA in each popsicle.
When we learned this information we looked around and noticed that every person was getting drugged, I remember thinking that if I took a picture of this I could blackmail these people and get myself a nice paycheck. But I’m not a paparazzi. After downing some more drinks we decided to head back to Amsterdam.
Don’t worry we had a designated driver, but one thing we did have to worry about was the hostess. As we were packing the car, the hostess with her eyes rolling and jaws all over the place was trying to convince us to stay. She kept yapping and we tried to hold her off, but we knew we seriously had to leave once she gave us all a nice invitation to her humble abode. Look, if it was a rock band I’m sure these guys would have jumped right on board. But these loyal guys have great relationships with lovely girls, so my job was to make sure this lady wouldn’t end up drugging these guys and taking them back for herself. So I told her a little fib to get her away, and that gave us just enough time to get out.
